Topnotch Topshop

Every time I go home I have one regret, something I didn't have enough time to do, someone I didn't have enough time to see. This trip I don't know how I did it, but I managed to squeeze in soooo much into 5 days. I ran around like a crazy person seeing friends, lounged around with my brother, ate at all my favorite restaurants, saw tons of family. I was there for 5 days but it seems more like 2 it went by in such a blur. However, I do regret not going into NYC earlier my last day there so I had time to go to one of my favorite stores, TopShop. While there are tons all over Europe, the US only has one in the Soho area of New York City. That makes it a shop I must stop at if I'm ever doing serious damage to my credit card there. Although, as I said, I didn't do either this last trip. My credit card probably breathed a sigh of relief.

Out of curiosity last night I checked out the store's website to see what I missed and it only further fueled my regret. Unfortunately I have no money, nor do I know how the store is sized well enough to order anything off of their website so I won't be ordering anything. But if I could, here's a few of the things I might consider.










I think this kind of accurately reflects my style right now which is a mixture of all over the place and a little bit of a modern glam take on the 20s. I blame my recent trip to the Chicago Institute of Art, Midnight in Paris, and Fashion Zen blog for that. It'll be interesting to see some of the outfits I come up with starting next week when the clinic reopens.

Store Rave: Sway

This week I was lucky enough to visit Santa Cruz twice. I think I have decided that out of all of the local towns, that one is my favorite. Don't get me wrong, I love some of the ones really close by (like Palo Alto), but Santa Cruz has some character to it. It's not your normal yuppie town. There are homeless people, hippies of all ages, college students, a yuppie here or there, and just all around interesting folk. There's also a wide array of food choices (which up here there seems to mainly be typical California food--Mexican or Asian themed) and more boutique style shopping with fewer chains.

One of my favorite stores there, if not my favorite, is Sway. I have now been there three times and have found some of the cutest clothes (I think eventually the owner will know me by name, haha). The store is essentially the closest you can get to a Modcloth shop (they even carry some of the same items for slightly cheaper) or a Topshop on the West coast. Lots of young trendy clothing items from casual to fancy with a small selection of shoes and accessories. Prices seem to run from $5-$70 with most items being under $40.

A variety of designers are carried and while generally the style caters to a younger hip crowd, there are some different styles as well (basics, earthy, 50s/60s retro, and the latest neu-80s ware). My mom found a lot of things she liked and I can definitely picture her wearing stuff like that when she was younger (very much her sense of style); she also bought herself a long sweater to wear with leggings. While I haven't bought something every time I've gone in, the things I have bought are of good quality. And I have always found something I liked.

Sway doesn't have an official website or sell things online, they do have a pretty active Facebook with lots of photos from past fashion shows they have had (wouldn't that be fun to attend). Here's a few of their looks from their Facebook:







I think I need to stay away from that store.

A Word to the Wise about Shopping at Forever 21

About 2 months ago I met a friend for dinner at the local mall. While I hate the mall that is closest to my parents, I got a little nostalgic after she left and decided to walk around a bit.

When I was in middle school the Palisades Center opened several miles down Route 59 from the Nanuet Mall. It became known as the New Mall and 10ish years later some people still call it that even though it drove the Old Mall out of business. I remember walking through it when it first opened and most of the store fronts were dark, with only 10 stores lighting the dark building (at least half of those stores aren't even open anymore). I remember being 15 and hanging out with my best friend, Katrina, at the arcade talking to boys, and I remember us being 17 going to the mall just to walk around and talk because neither of us had much money to shop. As much as I hate the mall because it's ugly and there's too many people there, I figured for old times sake, let's take a walk around because for 5 years I'm not going there.

So I rode the escalators, walked on all the floors, and just as I was being pulled into Gilly Hicks by their lovely overpowering signature fragrance that they pump through their vents, I was distracted by something colorful in the Forever 21 window and went there instead. I searched high and low for this mint/teal green dress with patterns on it that made it look like a broken animal print and only managed to find the one that was on the rack in the window. But it was a size large, and I was really disappointed because I am not a size large in any store other than maybe Baby Gap.

Now, I'm a little bit like a man, I hate to ask for directions and ask for help in stores. But this dress was under $20 and I really wanted it, so I went up to the guy who had greeted me when I walked in and asked him if there were anymore in the back. Looking down at the dress he said, "no, Forever 21's generally get about 10-15 of each item and they rarely get more shipments of a lot of things. Everything we have is on the floor, and we don't always get everything that's sold online." He told me with some things, they sell out the day they arrive they are so popular. Jeez, who'd have known? Disappointed, I left. But he taught me a good lesson that day:

-When you look online, chances are it won't be in the store because things sell out super fast
-Things sell out super fast because they get low shipment numbers of items
-Once it sells out, that's it

So if you've ever stalked a Forever 21 waiting for something to go on sale, restock, or even just arrive at the store because you saw it online, buy it when you see it or just get it online. And that being said, you need to spend $70 to get the free shipping. Keep that in mind the next time you want to impulse buy an $18 dress that's too big for you.

Not your Grandma's Thrift Shop

Before I start today's entry, a word about the updating schedule of the blog. I know I've been all over the place for starters with updating 3 times a day or not at all. I just wanted to get a few things up and running so the blog didn't look so stark before I went public with it. Starting this week I'm going to be on a more regular posting schedule. Every Tuesdays and Fridays I will always have an entry up. Chances are those entries will probably be more structured around a theme. But in between if there's a really good sale going on I'll post about it since sales are obviously a time sensitive thing.

Alrighty, on to today's entry!

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When I was in college I used to shop at the huge Salvation Army on the other side of town. I'd pick up lots of little boy t-shirts (like Superman and Tiger Scouts) and little girl sweaters from the 80s (complete with big flowers and purple hearts knitted into them) as well as anything that screamed 70s (I still have and LOVE my vintage puffy ski vest that I got for $7). I'd go every few weeks when I'd saved up about $20 of the money my mother would send me every month (Binghamton was a pretty cheap place to live which was great for my parents' wallet, but bad for mine because I'd get about $75 to spend on food and fun stuff for the month and it was near impossible to find a job) and I'm browse the long racks hoping to find a gem amongst the old lady crap most people dropped off. Tuesdays everything was 50% off, so I'd usually go then and stock up on other things too like old Nancy Drew books or vinyl. I always felt so...well...thrifty picking up stuff. But then I graduated and there isn't a single decent thrift store around where I live. And obviously now that I'm an adult with a real job with other adults, I can't get away with wearing little kid clothes to work.

Then last July I visited my best friend, Katrina, in Oakland, California to check out some graduate programs out there. It was the first time I had ever visited the San Francisco Bay area, but I was already pretty dead set on it being a top location that I wanted to move to for school. I asked her to show me around the different neighborhoods and take me to things that were outside so I could enjoy the great weather. In the process of doing that she took me to a couple of really cool second hand/sample sale stores and I must admit, I went a little overboard picking up quite a few things (actually now that I think about it I don't think I've done that much shopping since then). But at the end of the weekend, I only spent about $100 and ended up walking away with a lot of stuff.

The first place we visited (and my favorite of the two) was Jeremy's. Jeremy's gets their clothes from stores (either overstock, damaged pieces, display pieces, or customer returns). So everything is new, just a season or more older. I saw a lot of stuff from Anthropologie, J Crew, and other name designers. The store was not wicked cheap, but still cheaper than buying things full priced. I got a shirt and a cardigan from J Crew and I think I spent $50 total on both. There's two locations, one in San Francisco and one in Berkeley. Needless to say, I'll be frequenting Jeremy's when we move on to California...or on second thought, avoiding like the plague.

The second place we visited was Crossroads Trading Company. Crossroads has locations all over the country, and is basically a consignment shop. In our case, the locations were located near colleges, and a lot of students would come by and drop off their gently worn clothes (from the Gap to vintage to designer things) and sell them to the store to clean out their closets. There was also some things that were overstock products as well, but most of those things I'd never heard of the brands. In any event, almost everything was dirt cheap (rarely was there an item for over $10 unless it was designer) and the things were all in good condition. It wasn't like going to a thrift shop where everything smells of mold and dust, so you don't need to worry about spending a fortune in dry cleaning. I bought a new thermal and a used shirt dress and cardigan for $25.

When I asked Katrina about the places we visited for this entry, she also told me about another store that's very similar to Crossroads called Buffalo Exchange. I've never been there, but they are all over the country, there's a couple in the NY Metro area including Brooklyn and Soho. Also in Brooklyn is Beacon's Closet. My friends Jen and Lexie have been telling me about this places for years and I've never gotten my butt in gear to go. Perhaps I'm subconsciously avoiding it because I've heard of all the awesome things they have there and I don't want to go overboard spending money? Knowing me, that's probably the case.